Man Rule Refresher

Greatly appreciate all your very kind comments on my first attempt at Bravo blogging last week. It's fun to be able to just say whatever you want without any basis or need to fact check, just like a real blogger! It was a lot of fun to read your comments as well, thank you for taking the time to respond. And time now for Round 2 of the RHWODC Reunion Show!

While I did take some heat from some unnamed members of my Man Council for outing a few of our Man Rules and Rituals (and especially the Vegas Offsite), I feel I did it for the betterment of Reality Show Society and in the interest of helping the Man Rules underprivileged, who were not entrusted with the "Code" to see the error of their ways. I would always rather ask forgiveness than permission, so please find it in your hearts, Man Council, to forgive my numerous transgressions or I will default, as is my right, to my "Sorry, but I am not sorry" veto of any sanctions brought against me.

In that light, after viewing the RHWODC Reunion Show Part Deux, "someone" would appear to need a refresher course and some additional Man Rules and Regulations laid out for him in the interest of assisting him in getting into some big boy pants and out of the pull up over 200 Lb. diapers.

Man Rules Refresher: Say it aloud with me, "When asked a Yes or No Question, Please give a Yes or No Answer!"

Failure examples include:

Do you own the home featured on the show and on Bravotv.com?

Did you send your Financial Statement over in disappearing spy ink to Stacie to protect your privacy?

Did you donate any more wine than the one sparkling wine bottle you sabraged onto Lynda's badonkadonk for Paul's birthday party?

Man Rule: Look people in the eye when you are talking to them.

Failure to do so will give off the perception that you are either hiding something or not telling the truth. Eyes are often called the window to the soul and failure to maintain eye contact is disrespectful to the person you're lying, I mean, talking to.

Exceptions: You have no soul.

See also: If you can fake sincerity, the rest is easy.

Man Rule: Your wife should never have to tell you to apologize.

Especially to another woman. If you're unable to recognize you have just screwed the pooch big-time with a member of the opposite sex, you should be quarantined for the duration with a 24-7 ration of Oprah and Dr. Phil reruns until properly sensitized. In the case of disagreement, yes, women should encourage men to apologize in an abundance of relationship caution, but to be "told" you have to apologize indicates your internal filters need to be recalibrated and tuned up for life outside the cave.

Exceptions: Guy's Night Out (GNO)

I am not apologizing while getting my drink on, "Sorry For Partying" rules are in effect while men are in their "If I had feelings they would be hurt" zone. Women, we need this precious downtime from shouldering responsibility for always being wrong under the Hilary Clinton Act (HCA) that declared the #1 Rule that was obvious to women for centuries, "Men are always wrong," which was amended recently to add HCA #2 Rule: "When in doubt, see Rule #1."

Making mistakes and encountering failure is just an unavoidable fact of life, even on Candy Mountain. When you run the sparkly rainbow unicorn right into the neighbor's new car, do you take the walk of shame up to their door and confess and leave a note with correct contact info, or do you slink away and blame those drunken high school kids playing mailbox baseball again the next morning when you see your neighbor at the coffeehouse?

Eventually you run out of people to blame and there is just you. Let's circumvent years of irresponsible behavior and just own up to our mistakes and learn from our failures going forward. One of the great parts of the real world we live in here in the US is that people recognize mistakes are part of life and don't keep score for long, but they do judge and punish those that show no remorse or the inability to see the connection that their actions have caused harm to others.

See: The guidebooks to most major religions, such as the Bible (all versions), Koran, Common Sense for Dummies, etc.

Again, this season's Man Rule infractions are far too numerous and the space allotted by Bravo too small to address all of them.

After some quick research, "The Donald" is my new reality show role model, he pulls it all off brilliantly while maintaining his day job and fully employing all his children, AND still maintains a single digit handicap, much respect to Mr. Trump. Call me if you ever need a 4th to play golf on the Potomac!

Again, people, please hook my daughter Lolly up with any interesting opportunities in the art, music, and animal/equestrienne areas as she is passionate about all three. Follow her on Twitter @lollyamons and please remember, her Dad is the Total JackHole of the Millennium and she deserves a break or two.

Please also follow my favorite Housewife, Mary Amons, on all she is doing (which is a lot!) at www.labelsforlove.com and follow her on Twitter @maryamons. She is really the one who laid it all out there this season for the world to opine on, and I think she did a great job and represented our little part of the world very well in light of a social black swan of epic proportions that dropped in uninvited and whisked the show off to Candy Mountain. There are some very funny Mary and family video pieces that we hope you get to see on BravoTv.com in the near future. It was a pleasure to work with everyone at Bravo and Half Yard, they were great to us, and we appreciate it.

Yes, it's not generally thought to be the wisest of decisions to throw in with a reality tv show, but Mary, Bravo, and their team did a great job capturing a little taste of what I love about our town and the little Amons clan that puts the FUN in dysfunctionally functional! Thank you for watching this season and hope to hear from you here on BravoTv.com, Facebook, or on Twitter @richamons. Mazel and good things, people!

Wine Woes

Thanks again everyone for watching the first season of The Real Housewives of D.C. It's been an amazing experience in so many ways. The show was a great opportunity because although Washington, D.C. is the most powerful city in the world, it's not just known for politics. Washington, D.C. is also known for its philanthropic events combined with large social components. The show also focused on people from different backgrounds/experiences and their interactions with one another.

I am still amazed at the people who recognize us. We are so humbled by this and hope we've helped to show the positive qualities of the Washington, D.C. area.

In last week's episode and blog post, I briefly addressed the unfortunate incident between Lynda and Tareq. I wanted to wait until everyone (as in the cast and audience) saw the final cut of the reunion show before going into this mess.

As part of the promotional tour for the premiere of The Real Housewives of D.C. in late July 2010, the cast (women and for some strange reason Tareq) went to Los Angeles for a press junket. The press tour was over several days ending with a group dinner at Trader Vic's in Beverly Hills. As Lynda explained, towards the end of dinner Tareq was screaming and being verbally abusive to women. Lynda had asked Tareq settle down as they all have had an enjoyable evening, and it would be better for everyone to calm down. Tareq cursed at Lynda by saying "Shut the EFF up." Lynda replied in kind by saying, "You shut the EFF up," after which Tareq threw a glass of red wine in Lynda's face. Bear in mind that this exchange was witnessed by many people including press who were at an adjacent table. A few of the press members were also doused by the wine that had been thrown at Lynda.

I pause because I want you to picture this exchange and experience. Men, imagine if your girlfriend was cursed at by the same miscreant who then threw a glass of wine in her face! Regardless of the reason, that behavior is not acceptable. Even wild animals show more decency to one another. Many of you would have violently escalated your response to your woman being attacked. I would have acted similarly had I been there! Either way, it wouldn't have been a pretty picture.

On the reunion show, my comments were truncated as my anger was a lot more verbally manifested than was shown. Many would agree that I tend to be more reserved at times and the fact that I said, "I would have put him to sleep had I been there," only further expresses the rage I felt.

During that exchange, I mentioned his behavior was reprehensible and unacceptable, and I don't care if he had consumed copious amounts of cabernet, merlot, or crack! I don’t care what you're drinking, you never lay hands on a woman, nor throw ANYTHING at a woman. It shows a lot about the character of a man who feels that getting drunk absolves you from common social decency. As many of you noticed, even after this was discussed, Tareq and his wife still felt it necessary to give conditions for the apology. One event had nothing to do with the other, yet "The Spin Doctors" (not the band) found a way to link two unrelated events together.

Their use of spin, double speak, and rhetoric could rival the most seasoned politician. In other words, the Salahis answer questions with non-sequiturs and other unrelated examples. I learned at a young age that bad behavior is not absolved or defended by worse behavior. We all have a responsibility to be accountable for our actions, words, and behaviors, regardless of who you are, what disease you have, or what you may have "allegedly" done.

There are some who may disagree with my thoughts about the Salahis. That's okay, we don't have to agree on everything or anything. One of my goals in life is not to convince people of my views or opinions, but just to share them.

The Merriam-Webster's definition of delusion is as follows:

"A persistent false psychotic belief regarding the self or persons or objects outside the self that is maintained despite indisputable evidence to the contrary; also: the abnormal state marked by such beliefs."

You don't have to be a genius to understand that definition. I'm certainly smart enough to know that I have no interest in being a part of that world.

Now that this season is completed, I'll take the first rocket ship back to Earth please! Who's coming with me?

Thank you again for watching, following, and witnessing the experiences in our lives. We've learned a lot about people we've met and each other. I've built new friendships and professional relationships during this process. I'm trying to learn and grow just like many of you. I also look forward to hearing more from you all with your questions, comments, and thoughts!